Is #mastodon becoming an echo chamber? This post from @carnage4life has me questioning our community. The Mastodon team is finally getting some traction, the product improvements are increasing, The #UX is improving, yet people posting on multiple platforms are making comments like this. It's confusing.
I *know* people here don't want this to be a classic social media-clone but we'd *like* journalists to be here right? They aren't coming with examples like this!
As this conversation is spiraling a bit I want to make a few things clear:
1. I'd like Mastodon to be MORE inclusive and bring in more voices
2. Some people don't seem to want that
3. This is core problem to solve: How do we let more in, but not "pollute" your feed?
4. The solution is NOT "gatekeeping", revelling in the fact that AI journalists aren't welcome
5. This is the same reason we lost "Black Twitter" when it came over in 2022
Yes, a lot of you don't want AI posts in your feed (or pick any other topic) but the solution isn't to keep "AI People" from joining Mastodon, any more than it is keeping marginalized communities off of Mastodon.
@Gargron That is a personal choice and one which I totally respect. But I do think Mastodon should be big enough, and open enough, to allow an "AI community" to form, even thrive.
Too many people in my replies don't seem to agree with that.
@cratermoon @scottjenson @Gargron This is a very rich ethics question hidden in a specific example.
Would you permit or allow any community with which you disagree to participate on a platform, even if you’re not forced to participate?
A shortlist of thought experiments, to broaden the perspective, some of which are already here, some not…
- The oil & gas community
- Forestry workers (logging)
- The cryptocurrency community
- Workers at a chick rendering plant
- The finance industry
- Adult content creators
- Religious communities
Is there a litmus test for topics that you can or can’t discuss on the fediverse? Specific servers sure, but the whole fediverse?
Does that align with the values put forth by mastodon or the fediverse in general?
I don’t have the answers.
@trisweb @cratermoon @scottjenson @Gargron by definition, no. Literally anyone can spin up a server and talk about anything/try to get more folk to listen…
But other folk have to want to listen to whatever they are saying. Servers and individuals can just decide not to. No one is guaranteed an audience, just the ability to speak.
@pmdj @octothorpe @trisweb @cratermoon @scottjenson @Gargron Well fedi doesn't make you hear the bad opinions of people you chose not to follow by algorithmically putting them in your feed to make you mad and drive up engagement.
So that means you don't see the AI propagandists on here except when someone you follow is debunking them.
That is the exact opposite of what I said. I'm saying the fediverse gives you the tools to follow/block/filter/ to your hearts content to create the space you want.
What is corrosive is people ACTIVELY going after people they don't agree with. Just look at the replies to my post to get small sample.
My point was, I thought, very simple, and very reasonable: we should be more welcoming of more opinions. If you don't like them, then don't follow them. That should be the fedi-way. To be clear, I'm NOT endorsing AI, it just used it as an example.
Instead I'm living the very point I was trying to make. I've been told to leave, called a racist, and had ad hominem attacks leveled at me.
Now to be fair, my original post was poorly worded. I've owned that
https://social.coop/@scottjenson/116358195717244835
@scottjenson @pmdj No, we absolutely should NOT be "welcoming more opinions". "Diversity of thought" is NOT a value. Some opinions are wrong. They may have a right to exist, as long as they're not nazi opinions (those have no right to even exist), but that doesn't mean we have to welcome them. It's perfectly fine to tell people off for having bad opinions, to shun them, to let them share those bad opinions only with whoever is willing to listen to them and not in our circles.
If that causes them to leave fedi, that's not a bad thing.
I'm making a post on my timeline that you can ignore. There is a BIG difference to getting in someone's mentions and correcting them.
This is my whole point. We are each on the fediverse and we say what we want. You can like, ignore, whatever.
I'm NOT getting in anyone's mentions, I'm not scolding, I'm ASKING that we are more inclusive because it's the more humane and helpful thing to do, but hey, you can disagree, that's cool.
Okay maybe you need to be clearer on what you mean by "more welcoming"?
As was pointed out already, there is nothing stopping anyone from starting, say, a Mastodon Nazi Bar. It can exist, it can be publicly accessible, it can be open for anyone to join.
How could Mastodon possibly be made "more welcoming" than that?
After "the right to exist" for such people, though, there is no "obligation to be subjected to them" for anyone. Thank *bleep* for THAT.
@scottjenson @dalias @pmdj Also, every Mastodon admin has the ability to allow or block users and entire other servers.
Some servers are "safe places" for people that are heavily moderated so that their users aren't subjected to upsetting, triggering or hurtful content. Other servers are operated like a free for all where "anything goes" and anything is allowed through.
That gives end users the control they need to join the instance that best matches their own interests and sensitivities.
@scottjenson @dalias @pmdj So I think it's fair to, when you're suggesting that we should be "more inclusive", ask "how"?
Your OP hints at the notion that your perception of a lack of "inclusivity" is due to a systemic problem with how Mastodon works. So we ask "how do you suggest it be improved"?
People's choices are not a "platform issue". So what, in your opinion, is?
@scottjenson @dalias @pmdj hard to ignore the guy who works for mastodon that says that not giving equal time to folks killing puppies is a "personal choice"…
are you sure you work in PR?
@fishidwardrobe @scottjenson @dalias @pmdj this analogy comparing AI people to ‘people killing puppies’ is … interesting.
One I would argue is completely uncalled for.
@scottjenson @pmdj It's not an "evil plot" it's just irresponsible growth hacking that capitalist social media platforms are infamous for. People with shitty opinions drive rage engagement, so encourage them to come! 🤮
As I said when I first engaged with this thead, yes "more open to new ideas" and "more tolerant" are BAD THINGS without further qualification. "Diversity of opinion" is NOT a value. It's freeze-peach bro shit.
Yes we should strive to be as inclusive as possible towards people born different from us who have not had the same experiences, privilegs, etc. as us and whose needs, concerns, ways of communicating, etc. might be very different from our own.
This does not imply we should also be inclusive towards people who want to kiss tech industy ass.
@scottjenson after sleeping on it, I am choosing to respond because I cannot let your narrative go unchallenged, since you speak as a "Product Strategy Advisor to Mastodon Core team". Your intentions are probably good, but the words you chose to publish read a lot like unexamined privilege and a deep misunderstanding of lived reality of many people in this federation:
equating the experience of mass harassment on minorities to "journalists not getting engagement" is a slap in the face to both the victims of harassment and the volunteers (operators, moderators and developers) who keep this federation running. This reads extremely tone deaf and patronizing, and you antagonized a lot of people with that comparison
engagement dynamics being different than on mainstream parasocial platforms is not a bug, it is the main feature! Many (most?) people are here seeking a refuge from the exploitative attention economy and prioritize mutual connections above the parasocial one-way audience management that most journalists have been trained to seek out. I would not say that journalists are not welcome per se, but their usual methods definitely are
your example of "AI journalism" was very poorly chosen and contributed to the polarization. GenAI is NOT a neutral technology: it is the technological arm of an anti-social, parasitic and regressive societal project. This societal project is built on "values" that are the polar opposite of those that most instances in this federation uphold and is destroying countless lives, including those of people who are the rockbed of the Fediverse. Your replies minimizing this harm "because they're not nazis" read at lot like unexamined privilege
"big tent" attitudes are a red flag to many of us, because they usually end with marginalized people being pushed away while "the good gents" look away from the violence. Tolerance is a social contract, and people who promote anti-social views don't benefit from that social contract
The Fediverse is the opposite of an echo chamber! I picked up sewing and tried crochet, learned about insects and wild birds. I learned about the lives of people with chronic pain, several forms of neurodivergence and am following several blind authors. I read 10 thousands pages last year thanks to many book recommendations. It is one of the very few places that still feels human, and you are rubbing against people who fight to defend that.
I recommend you seek out feedback about this thread from several women and think about how you can come back to the conversation with a less antagonistic and tone-deaf attitude. We need people like you, but we don't need the "big tent" attitude you exhibited on this thread.
@scottjenson @dalias @pmdj I think what you’re talking about is called “talking to each other about our problems and working it out”, which is the only option left to us when we have no technical means of preventing different types of people from joining in on a community.
Unfortunately, some people are not going to agree with you. Nor are they required to. You can’t control them or ask them to behave differently, quite frankly. You can only control yourself and how you deal with it.
@trisweb @scottjenson @dalias @pmdj every server admin can put up server rules to encourage the community to treat each other in certain ways. They can enforce such rules.
Many countries have rules limiting free speech when individual freedoms of others are at stake. The cyberspace is subject to such rules.
@scottjenson @pmdj @dalias I'm with ya bro. Don't hear anyone complaining about ai application in the science fields. People are just focused on the slop side of things, not the tangible.
[edit]
Came back to posit a real world example.
Simulating ALL 100 billion stars in the Milky Way for the first time (with the help of AI?!
- Dr Becky
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFpW5W06kV4
"If you don't like them, then don't follow them. That should be the fedi-way"
I want people to build communities here. What you are proposing is what I've started calling "toxic individualism" - most Americans are taught this, and it's so pervasive that many of us don't even realize we are swimming in it.
But it prevents the many weak from coming together to protect themselves from the few powerful. I'm tired of being blandly atomized.
@pmdj @scottjenson Those problems would be largely fixed by reply controls and a working* block function, but for some reason Mastodon team can't give us those.
(*) By "working", I mean a block function that detaches all past replies by the account you're blocking from your posts, so that you're not serving as a billboard for their opinions every time someone expands your toot.
@lispi314 @pmdj @scottjenson If you have a client that's stitching them together, that's your business.
But my instance should not be using the "fetch context of this post by me" action to advertise hostile replies by someone I've explicitly blocked to others who are reading what I've written.
@pmdj @dalias
First, I'm using AI as an example, I'm not endorsing AI at all.
Second, and only as an example, there are open source people working on ethically trained local small language models. Again, I'm NOT endorsing them, but I can pretty confidently say that they would NOT be welcome here.
The same applies to journalism, there are VERY strong emotions here, basically telling them to fuck off (their words, not mine)
My point is that there is a pattern here: there are topics this community actively hates and "patrols" against. If that's what the community wants, cool, I'm not here to dictate anything. My point is that it might be nice to have a slightly more open way of sharing ideas: Follow, block, filter. You have the tools to make the feed you want (there are clearly more tools that would be helpful)
I'm just saying that focusing on your feed seems more healthy that attacking people whose opinions you don't like. Here, let me me give you an example of what I got 10 min ago
@pmdj @dalias Yeah, social media always attracts jerks. Just saying I'm not having a great day right now...
That reply is likely a distraction. I'm just saying that I'd like the fediverse to have more discussion more ideas more exploration and I feel that many of the people we'd like to attract don't feel safe doing that.
I'm not dictating anything, I'm just trying to create an environment that attracts more people that think outside our bubble.
@scottjenson I'm with @pmdj on his point that, there's no good reason to consider that the opinion of all or even the majority of people here. The way this works, wouldn't even make that any individual is connected to every other individual, same applies to instances. This by itself would make it likely not representative, but people might even be blocking topics and words and accounts about AI and have no idea of what's happening on AI threads.
@scottjenson we also know that nay sayers and assholes are usually more vocal than, people who like, or aren't concerned about something, and who are polite and respectful.
This doesn't mean that this noisy people aren't problematic, or act problematic about some particular topic, just that they need to be put into perspective, reported and blocked.
@scottjenson @pmdj @dalias I'm hoping in here far down on the chain but I feel I understand the conversation here and hopefully can be an alternative voice to the majority here. It seems a lot of people are getting caught up about the AI sentiment but I do believe what the real message is about is that there seems to be a very strong alignment towards one voice on this platform. I for one am one of the AI believers, and I hope eventually to sway a few more. But I would hardly consider my stances on the level of a puppy killer or a nazi as some in this thread have implied and I like to think its important that cross dialog between us all exist, otherwise we risk falling to an echo chamber of people who only validate our poorly challenged ideas.
On that note, I think what mastodon currently has is great, in that it shows a raw presentation of the platforms voices, instead of pandering you as many platforms do, which draws many people like me to the platform. I'm not here for the specific voices I hear amplified but because it still feels like an open discussion without too much manipulation and I would hate to lose that, even if it meant I got to see more voices like mine. However I think there are areas of mastodon that could serve to connect us less popular creators who want to find more people who think the way we do. For example the for you section or whatever feels very under-developed. Hopefully this is some actually helpful feedback to the original conversation.
Scott Jenson
Eugen Rochko
cratermoon
trisweb
CM Harrington
Roknrol like the slur
Cassandrich
Phil Dennis-Jordan
Pino Carafa
Fish Id Wardrobe ⁂
Kristoffer Lawson
Xavier
afreytes 🇵🇷
Kwaze Kwaze
Robert Riemann 🇪🇺
Marc "ACAB" Godin
De_Minimis
LisPi
jz.tusk
Francis Cook
Charlie O’Hara
Diogo Constantino
Beb0p